


The Winchester Family Circus

by bellacatbee



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Circus, Circus, Community: sabriel_mini, Eating Disorders, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, John Winchester's Bad Parenting, M/M, Mpreg, Secret Relationship, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-18
Updated: 2013-11-18
Packaged: 2018-01-01 21:09:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1048588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellacatbee/pseuds/bellacatbee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabriel ran away to join the circus, climbed the ranks and became a clown. He knows that he doesn't really belong however. John Winchester doesn't want him there. </p><p>Sam is a different matter. </p><p>Sam and Gabriel are having an affair, one that needs to remain secret. It would do, apart from a broken condom that leads to an unplanned and unexpected pregnancy that will force their secret into the light.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Winchester Family Circus

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my wonderful beta, Casness!
> 
> This story does include references to Castiel having an eating disorder but this is discussed from a secondary POV, normally Gabriel's, and is not focused on. 
> 
> The story takes place in a Universe where male pregnancy is normal.

Sam hated clowns.

He’d always found them terrifying. He didn’t know what it was about them – the painted smiles that seemed to hide the person behind them, the fact that they were associated with pranks and unfunny practical jokes or just the way that they seemed grotesque exaggerations of themselves.

Whatever it was about them, Sam hated them.

It didn’t make growing up in a circus much fun for him.

He liked all the clowns he’d known out of costume. Most of them had been dour men who drank a little too much and painted on their happiness, but Sam had still liked them.

Once they put their costumes on though, that had been when he’d found them frightening.

It didn’t matter that those were men who’d bounced him on their knees when he was a baby or who’d taught him how to swing a baseball bat when he wanted to learn. Sam still felt an anxious terror rising up in his stomach and he had to look away from them. He could never watch their acts. The most he’d ever managed was halfway through before he bolted backstage. His mouth felt dry, his palms felt sweaty and he didn’t feel safe again until that clown make-up had been washed off.

So it seemed a cruel twist of fate that the man Sam fell in love with should be a clown.

**

Gabriel had tucked and rolled his way into Sam’s life nearly two years ago. He was a runaway. He’d run away from his life, his family, from everything. It was a cliché that he ended up at the circus. At first he’d just worked as a general dogsbody, selling tickets and popcorn, cleaning up after the show, helping to pack up when the circus needed to move on. His natural comic talent and timing had revealed itself slowly over time and even then, John Winchester had been reluctant to let him preform. 

Acts were passed down in families. The children of trapeze artists learned the trapeze. John Winchester had trained his sons to be knife throwers and strong men. His father before him had worked as a knife thrower and Sam’s mother had been able to lift twice her own weight. It was a closed community with its own traditions and rules. 

Bringing in an outsider was unusual. It was only when Bobby Singer, the old clown who’d been part of the show since before it had been John’s, took Gabriel under his wing that Gabriel officially became part of their circus family. 

It had been a few more months of training and rehearsal before Gabriel made his big debut. Sam had watched a few minutes of the act, hidden backstage, and he had to admit that Gabriel looked at home in the spotlight. His smile, behind the bright red paint, was real. 

Sam didn’t know when he’d fallen in love with Gabriel. It had been a slow, gradual process. At first, he hadn’t even realized that it was happening. He and Gabriel had snarked and snarled at each other. Gabriel liked to tease him. Almost from the moment he arrived, Sam was his favorite victim. 

Gabriel craved Sam’s attentions, negative or otherwise. It had taken Sam a long time to realize that this was their version of flirtation. By the time he realized that, he also realized that it was too late. He was in love with Gabriel and he couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t extract himself or nip it in the bud. 

He never doubted for a moment that Gabriel loved him back. It was obvious. The moment Sam knew he loved Gabriel, he saw that everything Gabriel did was his way of showering him with affection. 

Sam had always been the one hesitating. Gabriel was just waiting for him to notice. 

As soon as Sam did, they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. 

**

The trailer was small, cramped. It was only meant for one person and that person was lithe and capable of bounding over the piles of useless rubbish that littered his room. Gabriel was not that person. He’d already fallen over a pile of clothes that Castiel said were waiting for the next laundry run. Now he was sat on a little stool at Castiel elbow, watching the trapeze artist apply his stage make-up. 

There were a lot of things about Castiel that weren’t fair, at least in Gabriel’s opinion, but the fact that he could wear glittery blue eye shadow and make it look good was the worst. Somewhere in her dressing room, two doors down from them, Castiel’s sister, Anna, would be applying glittery red eye shadow and that would only make her look more strikingly beautiful too. 

“Why are you pouting?” Castiel asked, glancing sideways at Gabriel, trying to hold the conversation while continuing to get ready.

Gabriel regarded the picture he and Castiel made together in the mirror. Castiel in his skin tight blue and white costume and Gabriel in his oversized trousers and brightly coloured shirt and tie. Castiel looked sleek, elegant. Gabriel looked funny. Gabriel knew that was the point but even when the costumes came off, they still looked the same. 

“I’m just thinking that life isn’t fair,” he said with a sigh. “I wish I could be some loose limbed, supple young thing.” 

Castiel pulled a face.

“You sound like those old perverts who hit on me and Anna,” he said. 

“You should put in the program that you’re married, The Dazzling Novaks – Husband and Wife trapeze artists. That would stop them,” Gabriel said. 

Castiel stuck his tongue out. “There’s enough interbreeding in the circus already without Anna and me pretending to be married.” 

“Besides,” he said, dropping his brush and reaching for a tube of lipstick. “Dean wouldn’t like it.” 

“Dean wouldn’t like it,” Gabriel mimicked back, succeeding in sounding just as childish as he felt. 

Even under all his stage make-up, Castiel’s cheeks flamed bright. 

“Well, he wouldn’t,” he said awkwardly. 

“I don’t think Dean would care,” Gabriel said, reaching out to pick up a compact from the dressing table. He opened it, frowning when he saw that all it contained was face powder. 

“You’ve got Dean all wrong,” Castiel said quietly. 

He pursed his lips, uncapped his lipstick tube and slowly, methodically, traced the red pigment on to his mouth. Gabriel watched him, frowning. None of it should work, but somehow Castiel just looked even more lovely with his dark hair and his dark red lips. It was stage make-up, made to help Castiel stand out, to make his features obvious to the crowd of paying customers but it just enhanced what nature had given him. 

Gabriel set the compact back down. 

“He’s using you,” he said boldly. “I think he’s slept his way through every dancer and contortionist his father has on staff. Anna wouldn’t give him the time of day so he changed his mind and starting fucking her little brother. That’s what I think about Dean.” 

Castiel continued to look mildly into the mirror. He didn’t even seem upset. 

“You’ve said that before,” he said, dropping his gaze to hunt for something, probably finishing spray to make sure it all stayed put under the hot lights. 

“Just because I’ve said it before doesn’t mean I’m not right,” Gabriel said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What about Sam?” Castiel asked. 

Gabriel’s own cheeks were painted on as two spots of bright, comical red. His own blush was thankfully hidden beneath them. 

“What about Sam?” he demanded. “Sam loves me.”

“Yes, you say that a lot too,” Castiel said, finding the little can of spray still buried in the bottom of his make-up bag. “He hasn’t told his father yet, has he?”

“Has Dean told John about you?” Gabriel countered, feeling triumphant. 

“John knows,” Castiel said. “I am, as you said, a distraction for Dean. He is confident that Dean will tire of me and while Dean is amusing himself, it stops him from causing trouble.” 

Castiel spoke so calmly, so matter of factly, that it completely floored Gabriel. 

“Did he tell you this?” he asked. 

“No, Dean told me. He was very angry,” Castiel said. “But his father has plans for the circus and Dean settling down with me is not one of them.” 

He closed his eyes for a moment and sprayed his face. Gabriel turned his head away, coughing. 

“Yes,” he said, waving his hand in front of his face to try and get some of the spray away from him. “But you can…I mean…it’s not about kids, is it?”

Castiel opened his eyes. He looked at Gabriel for a long, hard moment.

“I could give Dean children,” he said. “I wouldn’t be able to do it now. I would need to stop working, I would need to eat more, stop taking my pills but I could do it.” 

“So either John doesn’t want to break up his trapeze act or it’s just old fashioned prejudice,” Gabriel guessed. “Personally, I’m going with prejudice.”

“He doesn’t like you because you’re an outsider,” Castiel said. 

“He doesn’t like anyone. He tolerates some people because they’re useful,” Gabriel said, clenching his hands tight. 

Castiel stood up abruptly.

“It’s almost show time,” he said. “We should go.”

Gabriel knew that he shouldn’t try to rattle Castiel before a show. Castiel and Anna preformed without a net. If Castiel’s mind wasn’t completely focused on his work, if he missed a cue, he could fall and break something. Worse than that, he could die or Anna could. Castiel would never forgive himself if something happened to his sister. 

“Yeah,” he said, getting up and carefully moving towards the door. 

When they reached it, Castiel stopped him for a moment, his hand on Gabriel’s shoulder. 

“What about you?” he asked seriously. “Could you give Sam children?”

Gabriel bit the inside of his cheek. Castiel was always so direct. He didn’t know how to hint at things and the niceties of society had passed him by. Gabriel couldn’t even blame the circus for that. Anna was completely normal. 

“Uh,” he started, annoyed at not being able to think of any witty replies. “I…well, theoretically speaking the pipes are all in working order, but I’ve never exactly been careful so I guess I’m just one of those guys who can’t.” 

Castiel nodded. He squeezed Gabriel’s shoulder sympathetically. 

“And Sam?”

“Likes to use condoms,” Gabriel said with a shrug.

It might mean that Sam was one of the small percentage of men who could get pregnant or it might mean that Sam was just careful. Some men were never tested to find out if they carried the gene. Some of them didn’t want to know, didn’t want to believe it. Gabriel used to have a good chortle over the number of accidental pregnancies that accounted for. 

He always found it funnier when supposedly straight guys were standing there, hand on bump, swearing it had just been a one-time thing and they’d accidentally fallen on some guy’s dick. 

He’d been tested himself when he was a lot younger. When the tests came back positive, Gabriel had decided his attitude to life would just be live and let live. If something happened, he’d be okay with that and if nothing happened then he was going to be the luckiest guy fucking his way around the clubs. That had been when he was younger. 

Now he was older. Now he was in love. 

Now, when he saw the headlines on trashy magazines about accidental pregnancies, he didn’t laugh. He thought about how much he envied those guys. 

He looked at Castiel, at his tight leotard and his muscular, skinny frame. There wasn’t an inch of fat on him. There couldn’t be. Both he and Anna had to be light. Gaining weight would have thrown off their whole routine, would have added pressure. Gabriel wondered if Castiel didn’t look at other men who could fall pregnant so easily and envy them the way Gabriel did. 

“Hey,” he said softly. “You’re young and John Winchester drinks. He’ll probably drop dead of a heart attack soon and then Dean can marry you and you can have babies.” 

It was the only consolidation Gabriel could offer, an off-color joke. Castiel looked at him pityingly. 

There was a knock on the trailer door and both men jumped. 

Anna’s voice floated up from the outside, loud and angry. “Five minutes until curtain. What are you two doing? Get your butts out here right now!” 

“Our public awaits,” Gabriel said, opening the trailer door. 

He thought, for a second, that he’d seen Castiel frowning but when he looked back, his expression was completely neutral, the face of a consummate professional. 

**

Sam glanced out at the act under the footlights. He could only stand to look at them for a few seconds at a time. Gabriel was dancing about in big, oversized shoes, getting covered in a bucket of glitter. He pulled exaggerated faces, grimacing and pretending to cry. The audience laughed happily and Sam felt his stomach twist. He wished he could find clowns funny, but he just couldn’t. 

He was proud of Gabriel, proud of the way he delighted little children and adults alike. Gabriel could get a smile out of the most stubborn teenager, producing balloon animals and flowers from the vast pockets of his costume. He was a natural born entertainer and it showed. He looked perfectly at home. 

Sam still felt uneasy, a nasty anxious feeling settling on him, like a weight on his chest. He turned away and headed further backstage, looking for Dean. He knew his brother would be somewhere, honing his act. Dean practised every day. It didn’t matter how well prepared he was. He was always fearful of hitting Jo. 

Their father had hand-picked Jo as Dean’s partner in the knife throwing act. They had been working together since Dean was fifteen and Jo was thirteen. There was a level of trust between them that amazed Sam. 

Maybe with two other people that trust would have developed into love, but not with Dean and Jo. That was obviously what John had been planning when he’d put the two of them together. They would have made a good match. Jo’s parents had been part of the circus for years. 

It didn’t work out that way though. Dean thought of Jo as a little sister. He was protective of her, worried about her. Jo might have had a crush on Dean when she was a teenager, but Sam could see she’d grown out of it years ago. 

They’d been too close together for too long. Any mystique that could have existed between them had long since vanished. They’d seen each other naked too many times when they were changing. They’d both managed to nick each other with knives and come too close to causing real damage. They’d travelled together, lived on top of each other. They relied upon each other up on stage and off. 

They’d become partners, but not in the way John Winchester had hoped. 

Dean took his pleasure elsewhere. There were always dancers and acrobats passing through. It was the nature of the job. People came and went. 

It was an open secret that Dean was currently entangled with Castiel. It didn’t even surprise Sam. Dean always liked pretty, flexible people. The fact that Castiel was a man, not a woman, didn’t even cause him to raise an eyebrow. 

Besides, everyone knew it wouldn’t last. Their father wouldn’t allow it. He wanted Dean to settle down with a nice girl. If it wasn’t Jo, then he’d find someone else. 

John was even more restrictive when it came to Sam. Sam already knew his father would never turn a blind eye to what Sam was doing if he knew. That was why it had to stay a secret. There were only a few people Sam could trust enough to let them know.

He found Dean and Jo together, heads bent, sharpening their knives. Sam suppressed a shudder. He knew why the knives had to be sharp. They had to stick in the board Jo was tied to, had to pop balloons that were strung up around her. He knew that but looking at the knives, he could only imagine them slicing through Jo like butter. 

“Hey,” he said softly, settling down next to Dean.

“Are the clowns still on?” Dean asked.

Sam nodded. “Yeah, then Meg and the big cats, then Castiel and Anna.” 

Dean stopped suddenly, his shoulder’s hunching. 

“Right,” he said. 

He returned to the knife he was sharpening. Anyone else probably wouldn’t have thought there was anything odd about that but Sam knew his brother. He knew Dean worried every time Castiel was up in the air. There were only two things that frightened his brother – heights and their father. Seeing Castiel up on the trapeze terrified Dean. 

“Cas will be alright,” he said. 

“I know that,” Dean snapped. 

Sam looked over his head, catching Jo’s eye. She shrugged and shook her head. Sam knew what she was saying to him, he didn’t need her to put it into words for him to understand. There was no point in trying to reassure Dean. Dean would never admit that anything was wrong. It was better to just leave it. Dean would be alright again once Castiel’s act was over and Castiel was safely back on the ground. 

There was a large round of applause, the sound of whooping. The clowns act must have finished. The lights would be down for a moment, the old props cleared away and room made for Meg and her performing cats. Everyone was always deathly quiet during Meg’s act. The big cats looked fierce. Meg looked dangerous, storming about the circus ring in big black boots, cracking a whip and shouting instructions. 

Sam liked Meg, he liked her a lot but he didn’t like her act. Performing animals were something Sam thought should have gone out with freak shows and other Victorian amusements. He just didn’t know what Meg would do otherwise. That was the problem with their line of work. There wasn’t much of a chance to learn other skills. Either your act sold and you were successful, or it didn’t sell and you were quietly asked to leave. The circus felt like a family to Sam. He didn’t want anyone to be told to pack up and move on. 

Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of Gabriel toddling off in his ridiculous oversized shoes towards his dressing room. Sam would give him a little time, about ten minutes and then go knock on his door. That would have given Gabriel time to take off his wig and his make-up. He’d be looking almost normal again and Sam could usually ignore the silly costume. Without the rest of the clown dressing, it was just Gabriel looking stupid. 

**

The face paint they used was stubborn. It wasn’t good at budging. Gabriel wasn’t very good with taking it off either, if he told the truth. Castiel had baby oil and he was so careful an delicate, swiping at his cheeks and then going over his eyes with a cotton wool bud. Gabriel just used a pack of wet wipes and hoped for the best. He’s got most of it off although his eyes were still pretty gloopy with mascara and eyeliner and his mouth was going to be stained red for the rest of the night. 

He stared at himself in the mirror and thought about how old he looked. Gabriel had never told anyone his actual age. It was on his driver’s licence, tucked away in his wallet but no one had bothered to look at it. He’d be kidding himself if he said he was in his mid-forties. He was forty-seven years old. He didn’t even know what he was doing at the circus. Gabriel guessed it was a midlife crisis. He’d walked out of work one day, stopped answering his phone and just driven across country until something caught his eye. 

That something had been the circus. Gabriel had sat in the audience and watched, enthralled, as the acts performed in the main ring. He had never been to the circus growing up. It was too frivolous for his family. He’d been to see the French gymnasts do their thing in Vegas once, when he’d been out there meet a client. It had looked amazing but the atmosphere wasn’t the same. 

Gabriel liked the sawdust ring of his circus, the smell of the popcorn, the little towns they visited. There was something homely about it all. This circus was loved. It wasn’t just a job; it was a way of life. The people in it were all performers by birth. Most of them had never lived in the outside world. This was all they knew and it was all Gabriel had wanted to know from now on. 

They didn’t have business lunches or offices to stay late in. There were no mortgages to pay, no reports to be typed up. They were free from the confines of the society that Gabriel lived in and he envied them. 

The freedom of the circus hadn’t been the only thing that had appealed to Gabriel though. He’d sat in his seat and watched Sam Winchester stride on stage – young, handsome and so impossibly tall and strong. He’d been enraptured right from that moment. Gabriel was shallow, he admitted it freely, and the sight of Sam’s pretty face had helped his midlife crisis on the way. Gabriel had wanted himself some of that and, after a few years, he’d got him. 

Now he looked at himself in the mirror and wondered what in the world had made a bright young thing like Sam go for him. 

He sighed, grabbed another wet wipe and closed his eyes. 

There was a knock on his trailer door. Gabriel sighed, gave his eyes a quick rub, opened them, glanced in the mirror and admitted he looked a little better. He threw the wipe away and got up, opening the door. 

Sam was standing there, all oiled up and in his strong man loincloth. He looked nervous. Gabriel always found that the most disarming thing about Sam. He was such a big, imposing person but he had the softest soul. 

“Can I come in?” Sam asked, glancing around. 

Gabriel knew who he was looking for. John Winchester wouldn’t be out now. He’d be inside, making sure everyone kept to their time slot, stalking the ring and enjoying the power he had. He was the ring master, the controller. He basked in the glory of the applause and the audience adulation. He wouldn’t risk missing that to come and search for Sam, especially as Sam had already finished his act. 

“Yeah, you can come in,” he said, stepping back and allowing Sam to climb in. 

Sam looked like something out of a Tarzan movie in his leopard print loincloth. He was very handsome and hardly anything was left to the imagination. There was something raw and animal about him. That was all on purpose of course. Sam was selling sex appeal, a version of himself that was overtly masculine. People didn’t want to know that Sam liked reading Harry Potter or that he enjoyed crosswords. They just wanted to imagine how it would feel to have Sam’s big, strong hands on them. 

Gabriel didn’t have to imagine. He knew. He also knew how to tap in to the animalistic side of Sam and enjoy a nice, rough fucking. When they switched it up, he was always gentle with Sam. He was the first man Sam had been with. Gabriel could take a bit of manhandling. Sam was still nervous in so many ways. 

Gabriel still wondered why Sam had chosen him. He didn’t understand what Sam saw in him. He could have had anyone. He could have been like Dean, a Lothario who’d slept with half the circus but that wasn’t Sam. Sam had had a handful of serious relationships before Gabriel came along. He was always looking for someone to stay, someone to build a life with. Gabriel, who’d run away from his previous life, probably wasn’t the best person to try that with. 

Gabriel wanted to try though. He wanted to make Sam happy. 

“Just let me get these off,” he said, gesturing to his clothes. 

All he had left on were the baggy pants and the silly colored shirt but he knew Sam didn’t like them. Once Gabriel was stripped out of them, Sam generally looked a lot less nervous. Gabriel hooked his suspenders off his shoulders, pants dropping down immediately. He wiggled out of them and tugged off his shirt. 

Clad only in his boxers, Gabriel felt better. His mouth was still bright red, but he was much closer to looking normal that he had a few seconds ago. He kicked his costume into a corner of the trailer and smiled at Sam.

“Not scary now?” he asked teasingly. 

Sam smiled at him. He stepped forward and brushed his hand through Gabriel’s hair, cupping his cheek. He tipped Gabriel’s chin up and kissed him, smearing Gabriel’s lipstick over his own mouth. 

“I try to remember it’s you under the make-up,” he said with a sigh. “I do. I can’t help what I’m scared of.” 

“I know,” Gabriel said, wrapping his arms around Sam. 

Sam smiled and bent his head, nuzzling his nose against Gabriel’s cheek. He kissed him again before picking him up. Gabriel wrapped his legs around Sam, grinning. He loved how Sam could hold him up as if he was weightless. He’d never felt light. He’d always felt as if he was short, dumpy, too close to the ground. He wasn’t one of those willowy creatures like Castiel and Anna who looked so beautiful, they were hardly real. Sometimes, they looked as if they could float away. Gabriel was too weighted, too solid. He belonged very firmly to reality. 

With Sam he felt different. He felt as if Sam never saw him the same way he saw himself. He was sure Sam saw him as something wonderful. 

“Come on, big boy,” Gabriel said, nudging Sam in the small of the back with his heel. “We’ve only got an hour until the show finishes. I think you can come twice before you need to get back on stage for your curtain call.” 

They could only grab moments together when they had the chance. Sam slipped away while his father was busy. When everyone was performing was the best chance they got. They could both slip away, John Winchester never cared if Gabriel missed the curtain call and Sam had a much better recovery time than Gabriel anyway. He could get fucked, clean himself up, roll out of bed and arrive ready to take a bow as if nothing had happened. 

Gabriel just lounged in bed, enjoying the feeling of being stretched and well-fucked. That was what he intended to do tonight. One day, Sam was going to wake up and realize he could be with someone younger, someone prettier than Gabriel. 

Gabriel was planning to enjoy the ride until that day. 

Sam kissed him again, messy and hungry, carrying him over to the narrow little bed Gabriel slept in. He dropped Gabriel down on to the bed and crawled over him.

“So, two times in one hour? Think you can really keep up with that pace, old man?” he asked. 

His mouth was red. His eyes were bright. Gabriel stared up at him and groaned, his cock throbbing with how much he needed to get Sam’s hands on him.

“Are you gonna talk or are you gonna fuck me?” he growled. 

“Fuck you, definitely,” Sam said, smiling. 

He ground down against Gabriel’s, his loincloth bunching up around his hips as he did and Sam wasn’t wearing underwear. His cock was big, gloriously huge. Gabriel had never been with another man who was as big as Sam. He’d always liked bigger men, the ones who were big all over, and Sam was the perfect example of everything he liked. 

There was something about being manhandled that appealed to Gabriel and Sam could certainly do that. 

“Come on, come on,” he urged Sam, rocking his hips up. 

His cock was hard and he wanted to be out of his boxers and in to Sam. Or have Sam in him. Gabriel didn’t care. He just needed the contact of skin against skin. 

Sam made a deep, feral noise and reached between them, hooking his fingers into Gabriel’s boxers and tugging them off. He threw them on the floor beside them, then sat back on his haunches and rolled Gabriel over. 

Gabriel arched his hips, spreading his legs. He could hear Sam shifting behind him, digging through the bedside cabinet until he grabbed hold of what he was looking for – one of the bottles of lubricant Gabriel kept there. Gabriel had about seven different ones, flavoured lubes mostly. He liked the sweet taste of them, liked drizzling them over Sam and licking them up. He kept a bottle of plain lubricant too and he knew that was what Sam was searching for. 

He heard Sam uncap the bottle and a moment he felt Sam’s fingers, blunt and big, rubbing against his hole. Gabriel moaned, shoving his face into his pillow and canting his hips back. Sam slipped first one, then two fingers into him. He scissored them, spreading Gabriel wide open. Gabriel dug his nails into his thin mattress, fighting to stay still. He’d have time to move later, time to fuck himself back on Sam’s cock but he knew Sam worried about getting him stretched out. Sam was always frightened he’d hurt Gabriel, that he’d be too big or Gabriel would be too tight. 

Sam added a third finger and Gabriel groaned loudly. Sam started to thrust his fingers and Gabriel bit his lip, lost in the sensation of being so full. It was so good, the feeling of Sam’s fingers thrusting in him but it wasn’t as good as it would be when it was Sam’s cock. This was the pre-show, filled with the promise of what was about to come. 

Sam pulled his fingers free and Gabriel sighed at the empty feeling. He knew it wouldn’t last for long but he still found himself pushing his hips up, begging bodily for Sam to hurry up and fuck him. 

Sam shifted behind him, his warm body pressing against Gabriel’s. The blunt head of his cock pressed against Gabriel’s hole. Gabriel wiggled back against him as Sam pushed forward and a second later, Sam’s cock was sliding smoothly into him. It took Gabriel a moment to get used to the feeling of being stretched so wide and filled so completely. It didn’t matter how often they did this, there was always a moment of discomfort, always a moment where Gabriel thought that Sam was too big. Then Sam bottomed out, Gabriel adjusted, and it began to feel delicious. 

The first few thrusts were torturously slow. Sam hardly moved at all, rocking slowly back and forth. Gabriel whined, shoving himself back on Sam’s cock, trying to show him exactly how he wanted to be fucked. He felt Sam still, heard him chuckle.

“Show me how you want me to fuck you,” he said.

Gabriel groaned loudly in protest. He didn’t want Sam to tease him. He wanted Sam to pin him down and fuck him hard the way he knew he could, but Sam was in the mood to play. Gabriel knew he loved teasing Sam when he was on top, so this was just tit for tat as far as Sam was concerned. 

Gabriel pushed himself back on Sam’s cock, trying to get it has fast as he wanted but he didn’t have the same control Sam did. It wasn’t as satisfying.

“Come on, Sam,” he said, unable to believe Sam could stay so cool and composed. 

He clenched tight around Sam’s cock and felt Sam buck forward in surprise, a gasp tugged from his lips. Gabriel smirked to himself and did it again, rocking himself back on Sam’s cock. Sam gripped his hips hard, driving himself into Gabriel hard. That was what Gabriel wanted. He didn’t want to be treated like he was fragile. He didn’t want Sam to worry about breaking him. He wanted bruises and fingerprints all over his body. Gabriel knew he could take it and he knew Sam wanted to give it to him. 

Sam’s pace was brutal. Gabriel buried his face in his pillow, muffling his moans and hiding his grin. He loved this feeling. When he woke up tomorrow, when he and Sam had to pretend they weren’t together, the marks Sam left on him would be proof this was all real. It would be proof that Sam loved him. 

He reached down between his legs, wrapping his fingers around his cock and fisting it roughly. He couldn’t keep up with Sam’s thrusts. His fingers kept slipping. He just squeezed and tugged and felt his orgasm building. He could feel a tingling in the base of his cock, could feel it spreading through him, could feel it down in his toes. All it took was one good thrust, one that had Sam’s cock pressing hard against his prostate, and Gabriel was coming. 

Sam stopped thrusting, waiting until Gabriel had stopped trembling. He eased his still hard cock out of Gabriel as Gabriel whimpered, his body feeling stretched and oversensitive. 

Gabriel slumped forward on to the bed. He turned his head feebly to watch Sam stroke himself. He’d taken the condom off and tossed it away and Gabriel got to watch as Sam came. He looked gorgeous – his head thrown back, his hand tight around his cock, come leaking down over his fingers. 

“Fuck, Sam,” he murmured. “You look good enough to eat.” 

Sam opened his eyes and smiled lazily at him. He slumped down over Gabriel, covering him bodily and kissed the back of his neck. Gabriel squirmed, getting comfortable under Sam’s weight. 

“Are you sure you’re going to be ready to go again?” Sam asked. There was a gentle concern in his voice. 

Gabriel knew Sam wouldn’t hold him to anything he’d said during the heat of the moment. He stretched and squirmed a bit more, taking care to rub up against Sam’s cock. Sam moaned softly. 

“Yeah, give me a few minutes and I think I can go again,” Gabriel said. 

If he could keep hearing Sam moaning like that, it wouldn’t take him any time at all. Gabriel prided himself on the fact that with Sam, his recovery time was quick. Maybe if he got it as often as he wanted, if they could be slow and lazy, he wouldn’t feel that way but Gabriel knew these stolen hours were all he was getting so he made the most of them. 

**

On the second go, the condom broke.

**

Sam was back in time for the final curtain call. He was tired, his mouth was red with Gabriel’s make-up and his body ached. Sam wished he could stay curled up in Gabriel’s narrow little bed with him, but that wasn’t an option. Even helping Gabriel clean up after a split condom wasn’t something he could do, not if he was going to make it back before his father noticed he was missing. 

Sam felt awful. It wasn’t in his nature to be deceitful and he certainly didn’t want to be the sort of man who disappeared during the tough times. Gabriel had told him to go but that didn’t make him feel any better about it. 

He plastered a smile on his face, walked around the ring behind Dean and Jo, waving at the audience. There was a lot of noise – people clapping, people getting up ready to leave – but it all washed over Sam. He was glad that he wouldn’t have to be out there for much longer. One complete circle of the circus ring and they were able to duck away, out the flap at the back of the tent and backstage. 

The moment they got there, Jo turned around, licking the thumb of one hand and grabbing Sam’s chin with the other, holding his face still.

“Everyone’s going to know if you can’t get this off,” she said, rubbing her thumb across his lips. “You never wear anything this bright.” 

Sam relaxed, letting Jo rub until she seemed satisfied. She dropped her hand and smiled at him.

“It’s an open secret anyway, but I suppose we’ve all got to keep up appearances,” she said, smiling at him. 

“At least you didn’t miss the curtain call,” Dean said gruffly. 

Sam knew Dean didn’t exactly approve of his choice. Gabriel was a lot older than Sam was. Dean would have preferred it if Sam was with someone younger, someone they knew from before. He probably would have preferred it if Sam was with a girl, but at least Dean kept his opinions to himself. He didn’t try to tell Sam what he should do with his life. He just waited there to pick up the pieces if it went wrong. Sam appreciated that. 

Sam shifted, tugging at his loincloth. He really wanted to get back to his trailer and into something more comfortable. He knew he couldn’t do that just yet though. 

Almost as soon as he thought it, he heard his father’s voice. “Sam! Dean!” and then his dad’s hand clapped down on his shoulder and stayed there. His father was smiling, still buzzing from the adulation of the crowd. “Come and have a drink with me, won’t you?” 

It was an invitation but Sam knew better than to try and turn it down. His father expected to see both him and Dean there. He preferred drinking with someone there. It made it seem more acceptable and less like a problem. 

“Sure,” Sam muttered at the same time as Dean nodded. 

Sam saw Dean’s eyes stray to the hand on Sam’s shoulder. He saw the longing in Dean’s eyes. He thought it was a fatherly gesture but Sam knew differently. It was all about control. His father wasn’t proud of him. He wasn’t reaching out to him because he cared about him. He was making sure that Sam couldn’t walk away. He didn’t need physical force where Dean was concerned. Dean always did as he was told. Dean was the good son. It was Sam who caused trouble. 

Dean forced himself to look away and turned towards Jo. 

“You take care of yourself, okay?” he said, reaching out to stroke over her arm. “I’m going now.”

It was a gesture that could almost fool someone who didn’t know them in to thinking there was something between them. Sam saw the protective concern in Dean’s eyes though. He must have missed a mark tonight, thrown one of the knives closer than he should have. 

“I’m fine,” Jo said, brushing his hand away. “Go, have fun. Try not to drink too much.” 

“Right,” Dean said. 

Sam guessed that if he had a choice, Dean would have preferred to hang back and talk with Jo, but that wasn’t an option. Dean would always choose their father over anyone else. He wanted his approval more than anything. He was like one of Meg’s performing cats, ready to jump through all the hoops John set out in the hope of getting some titbit of affection in return. It made Sam feel awful, thinking of his brother like that so he took a deep breath and tried to think of something else.

Hopefully neither of them would have to stay long. Sam hoped that John would be in a drinking mood, not a talking mood and that he’d pass out pretty quickly. Those nights were always the easier ones. The nights when his dad wanted to lecture and reminisce were nights Sam preferred to forget. 

They reached John Winchester’s trailer, the biggest one on site, and John unlocked the door. He reached inside, flicking on the light switch and a second later, the lights flickered on. One of the bulbs was gone, Sam noticed, shielding his father’s bed in shadows. Dean would probably be deputised to replace it the next time they were close to a hardware store. 

The lights illuminated other things though, the pictures cluttering John’s dressing table, along with empty bottles. They were of happier times. Pictures of John and Mary together, pictures of the Circus when it was still young. So many people had moved on, gone to pastures new or quit the business altogether. Others had died. Mary had died. There were a few pictures of Sam and Dean but only as small children, nothing that showed them as they now were. 

Sam knew the pictures by heart but he still looked at them because they only told half of the story. There were no photos after Mary died. There were no photos of John’s other loves and no photos of his other son either. Adam had been one of those who’d moved on. His mother, an acrobat, had seen the writing on the walls when Adam was five. She’d packed up and gone back to school, got her nursing diploma. She’d written, sent pictures of Adam and told them how he was getting on. It had always been Dean who’d written back. 

Sam swallowed thinking about it. Adam was a teenager now, about to go away to college and start studying medicine. He’d had a chance to do something else, a chance to live a life outside of the circus. It had never even been a suggestion for Sam. This was his life. He was born into it and that was the end of it. It always amazed him that some people, like Gabriel, ran away to the circus because it gave them freedom. To Sam, it had always been a prison. 

John stumbled towards the dressing table, hunting through the bottles until he found one that was still half-full. Dean fetched the shot glasses and Sam sat down obediently. John poured out the shots and the three of them drank in silence. The whisky, it was always whisky that his father drank, burned his mouth and down his throat. Sam didn’t drink often. It was never something he’d acquired a taste for. He didn’t mind an occasional bottle of beer but he found hard liquor hard to handle. 

Dean and their father seemed to take to it like water. 

A second round of shots followed. Sam swallowed his quickly, not wanting to taste it and this time the burn was dulled. By the third shot, he hardly felt it any more. 

“Are you still seeing that boy?” John asked suddenly.

Sam looked up, startled, worried that it was Gabriel his dad was talking about although it would have been a stretch to call Gabriel a boy. His dad wasn’t looking at him though. He was looking at Dean and Sam relaxed guiltily. His secret was safe, his dad still didn’t know. He just wanted to grill Dean about his affairs. 

Dean nodded uneasily. Sam could see the way he tensed, knew Dean was waiting to see where the conversation was going, not convinced it would take a pleasant route. 

John looked at him thoughtfully. “You should try his sister.”

“I did try. She doesn’t like men,” Dean said.

Dean looked sullenly at his shot glass and Sam didn’t know if he was thinking about Anna turning him down or if it was a lie to get their father off his back. Sam looked down at his hands. John continued to look thoughtful.

“Still,” he said after a pause. “I suppose it’s all the same in the end. Bend him over and it’s the same as fucking a girl.” He roared with laughter at his own joke.

“Yeah,” Dean said through gritted teeth. 

Their father didn’t seem aware of the sudden chill in the air. He went on chuckling to himself, pouring out another shot of whiskey. Sam wished Dean would say something. He wished that Dean would stand up for Cas, for what the two of them had together. It would have made it easier for Sam to do the same. 

His dad would never make off-color jokes about Gabriel. He’d never accept Gabriel in the half-hearted way he accepted Castiel. Castiel was something ethereal. He moved easily, fluidly, between masculinity and femininity. Gabriel didn’t. Gabriel was exact and unshakeable and Sam loved him for that, but John didn’t like him. Gabriel wasn’t one of them. John could tolerate Castiel because he was from an old family and he didn’t believe Dean really cared for him. Gabriel would be different. 

Sam would never be able to lie as convincingly as Dean did. He would never be able to pretend that Gabriel didn’t mean anything to him. It would be obvious to everyone that he was in love with the other man and that was why it had to stay a secret, at least from John Winchester. It didn’t matter who else knew. 

No one else would have cared but Sam’s dad did and that was why Sam needed to keep it from him. 

**  
 **Two Months Later:**

Gabriel hunched over the toilet bowl, a shudder running through him. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, said goodbye to his lunch and pressed the flush. He didn’t know what had come over him. The fish tacos he’d eaten for lunch must have been bad. When he thought back, he guessed that they’d tasted a little odd. Castiel had only picked at his but then Castiel ate like a bird anyway. That was probably why it was Gabriel in the bathroom, puking up his guts, and Castiel standing outside browsing the rack of magazines. 

Gabriel stood up straight, waiting to see if he felt nauseous again but it seemed that his stomach was empty at last. He flicked open the catch on the bathroom door and headed for the sink, washing his hands and swilling his mouth out with cold water. He glanced at himself in the mirror and sighed loudly. Gabriel was never going to be one of those people who looked better for being sick. His cheeks were flushed pink, his eyes were watery and he looked like he needed a long nap. 

Gabriel dried his hands and exited the bathroom, almost bumping straight in to Castiel. 

“Oh, you’re done,” Castiel said. “I was just coming to find you.”

“Why?” Gabriel asked.

“I bought you this,” Castiel said, holding out a little rectangular box. There were blue and pink swirls on it and a picture of a beaming, happy looking man. 

Gabriel took it from him, frowning. 

“You bought me a pregnancy test?” he asked, deeply confused. “You think I’m throwing up because I’m pregnant? No, Cas, it was the fish tacos. I should know better than to eat seafood from a van.” 

Castiel frowned.

“I don’t feel sick and we ate the same things,” he said. “I just think you should try it, Gabriel. I did buy the test for you.” 

Gabriel opened his mouth to argue, to protest that Castiel had only eaten a quarter of his taco while Gabriel had eaten two of his own and finished Castiel’s leftovers but he shut his mouth again quickly. It wouldn’t be fair to bring up that up. Castiel struggled enough with his weight already without Gabriel pointing out that he hardly ate. Besides, Castiel had paid for the damn test so why not use it? Otherwise it would just sit in Gabriel’s trailer, gathering dust. 

“Okay,” he said, waving the test at Castiel. “But when it comes back negative, you’ll just have to agree that it was the tacos.” 

**

A few minutes later, Gabriel was staring at two blue lines. He read and re-read the info on the back of the packet, hoping it had changed since the last time. He kept hoping he’d read it wrong, but he knew he hadn’t. Two blue lines meant a positive. Gabriel was pregnant. 

It didn’t seem possible. He’d spent years being irresponsible and nothing had ever happened. Now all it took was one broken condom and he was pregnant. The test had to be wrong. Gabriel had to be wrong. He couldn’t be pregnant. 

He stepped out of the bathroom stall to find Castiel leaning against the sink. He didn’t know how long Castiel had been there waiting for him. Gabriel hadn’t heard the door open but Castiel was like a cat – he moved quickly and silently. It always gave Gabriel a little jolt to see him turn up suddenly where he hadn’t been expecting him. 

“How long have you been there?” he asked. 

Castiel ignored his question, posing one of his own. “What’s the result?”

Gabriel sighed, tossing both the test and the packaging into the trash. He stepped up to the sink and turned on the water, washing his hands.

“I need to see a doctor,” he said quietly. “I’m not saying I think the test was right, but I need something more concrete than just peeing on a stick.”

Castiel looked triumphant. “So you’re pregnant.”

“It could have been a false positive,” Gabriel muttered, turning off the taps and reaching to grab a paper towel. 

He wiped his hands, feeling thoughtful. He didn’t feel as if he was pregnant. He’d thrown up but that could have been the fish. He couldn’t imagine that there was something growing inside him. He didn’t feel anything. Certainly no fatherly impulses or great swells of love. He just felt disbelieving. 

“Do you want me to buy another test?” Castiel asked. 

Gabriel shook his head.

“No, I want to see a doctor,” he said, not sure how he’d manage to do that. 

It wasn’t as if he was signed on with anyone. He didn’t have insurance. He’d just have to get an appointment where they were stopped and pay for it out of his own pocket. He certainly couldn’t go and ask his boss for help, not when that boss was John Winchester.

“Are you going to tell Sam?” Castiel asked softly.

Gabriel shook his head.

“No, not until I’m sure. I can’t tell Sam before then,” he said. 

He had no idea what Sam’s reaction would be and he too eager to test the waters until he knew he had to. If he was pregnant, if the first test was right, then Sam would have to know. Eventually, it would all have to come out. Gabriel knew that but he wasn’t ready for it to happen yet. He had to get used to the idea of being pregnant himself before he told anyone. 

He also needed to plan what he was going to do. If it turned out to be true, if he really was pregnant, there were only so many options he could choose. Somehow, Gabriel didn’t think John Winchester would want a pregnant clown on staff. 

He’d probably like the idea even less when he found out it was his own son who was the father. 

**

Gabriel wondered if Castiel ever noticed the way people looked at them. Castiel seemed blithely unaware of the looks they were getting in the doctor’s waiting room. He was flicking through one of the out-of-date magazines, apparently enjoying himself. It was Gabriel who was left people watching and he’d seen the looks they were getting. 

No one wanted to sit near to them. People glanced at them from the corner of their eyes and whispered. The receptionist on the desk had frowned when taking Gabriel’s details and asked him archly how he was intending to pay. Gabriel knew what the question had really meant. The receptionist had been asking if Gabriel meant to pay or if he was planning to skip town. There’d been a time when no one asked Gabriel those questions, when he saw a private doctor and no one doubted if he could pay. 

“Don’t get too close,” someone hissed, causing Gabriel to look up. A man was clutching a child by the arm, pulling the little girl bodily away from them. “They’re circus people. They’re dirty.” 

Gabriel made a horrible face, sticking his tongue out and crossing his eyes. He saw the man glare at him but the girl giggled. Castiel hadn’t even stirred from the article he was reading.

Gabriel slouched back into his chair, pressing a hand to his stomach. He really didn’t believe he was pregnant. It just seemed too farfetched but if he was, how would people respond? Would people say he was an unfit parent simply because of his job? That his child would be irrevocably damaged from being born into a travelling life? Other children had grown up in the circus and had grown into fully-rounded, normal adults. Sam had grown up in the circus, so had Castiel.

Gabriel cast a sideways glance at Castiel, noting that he seemed to be reading about liquid eyeliner techniques. Perhaps Castiel wasn’t the best example of someone who’d grown up normal but in every way that Gabriel thought was really important, Castiel was settled. He was kind, he was thoughtful, he was brave. His eccentricities were nice ones, ones that made him more interesting to Gabriel’s mind. 

Castiel issues were ones that could have happened to him anywhere, at any time. He could have been working in an office block and still eating like a little sparrow, skipping lunch and refusing breaks. It wasn’t the circus that was responsible for that. 

If Gabriel really was pregnant, he didn’t think the baby would suffer from growing up in the circus. Not that he was pregnant though. Gabriel was very firm on that. 

A door opened and a messy head of light brown hair poked out through the gap, looking around the room. Gabriel gathered this was the doctor. He looked untidy, unshaven and as if he hadn’t slept in days. The man looked at the waiting patients with bleary, confused eyes before his gaze finally landed on Gabriel and Castiel. 

“Um, Gabriel Tricksler?” he asked hopefully. 

Gabriel nodded. He nudged Castiel in the side, getting his attention. 

“Come on, Cas,” he said. 

He wanted Castiel with him. He didn’t want to be alone. He was perfectly certain what the result was going to be but all the same, there was this nagging fear, this doubt, that told him it might be better to have Castiel there with him. 

“I’m Dr. Shurley,” the man said, shaking hands with first Gabriel and then Castiel. He motioned them to follow him into his office. “You’re in the circus aren’t you? Great, good. I’ve got tickets to see you. My girlfriend wanted to go. She likes the strongman on the posters.” 

“Yeah, me too,” Gabriel muttered, a ghost of a smile crossing his lips. 

Dr. Shurley smiled at him. He gestured for the two men to take a seat and then sat down in his own chair, spinning around to face them.

“So, what can I do for you today?” he asked. 

Gabriel licked his lips. He really wished he had something to eat. He was hungry now, the nausea that had attacked him earlier was gone. Something sweet would hit the spot around now but he didn’t have anything so he licked his lips again. 

“I took a pregnancy test and it was positive. I need to know…” he trailed off, hoping the doctor would understand.

Dr. Shurley nodded in comprehension. 

“You want another test to confirm,” he said. He glanced at Castiel. “Are you the father?”

“Does he look like the father?” Gabriel snapped irritably.

“No, I’m just a friend,” Castiel said calmly. “The father is the strongman.” 

“There is no father! There is no baby!” Gabriel said. 

He knew that there couldn’t be a baby. This sort of thing didn’t happen to him. It happened to other men. It was a fluke, an impossible chance. 

“Right,” Dr. Shurley said. “Well, we can do a blood test if you like. That’s the most reliable way of checking but the results won’t be processed until tomorrow. We’d need to send them to the big hospital two towns over and then they’d send us the results.”

Gabriel tried to imagine waiting another day or two for the results. He couldn’t imagine it. He had to know now, today. He wasn’t always so impatient. He’d waited for Sam; he’d waited for his chance to work as a clown. He’d known how to bide his time and pay his dues but this wasn’t the same sort of situation at all. 

“No, I need to find out today!” he said. “You’re a doctor! Aren’t you supposed to be able to tell?”

Dr. Shurley looked at him critically. 

“As a doctor, I use science, not divination. I can’t just look at you and know you’re pregnant. It would save a lot of paper work if I could.” 

“Is there another test you can run?” Castiel asked helpfully.

“Sure,” Dr. Shurley said. He pulled open a draw in his desk, rummaged through it and pulled out a test tube which he threw at Gabriel who caught it awkwardly. “Go pee in that.” 

Gabriel frowned at the doctor. He’d liked him better when he’d been shuffling and polite. Now he was approaching sarcastic and Gabriel wasn’t sure he approved of sarcasm in medical professionals. 

“The bathrooms just down the hall,” Dr. Shurley said, smiling at him. 

**

Gabriel returned a few minutes later, the test tube filled. He handed it from the doctor who took it from him and turned away from the two men, busying himself with litmus paper and testing. Gabriel sat down, rubbing his hands on his trousers. 

“How long will it take?” he asked nervously.

“Only a few seconds,” said Dr. Shurley.  
Castiel reached out, placing one hand on top of Gabriel’s. The weight and warmth were reassuring and Gabriel found himself relaxing a little at the touch. Things weren’t as bad as they could have been. Gabriel was worrying but he didn’t have a reason to. This would put his mind at rest and then everything would go on as normal. 

“Ah,” Dr. Shurely said, turning to look at Gabriel. “According to this test, you’re pregnant.” 

Gabriel looked at him aghast and Dr. Shurely continued quickly. “You could always take the test again.” 

“No,” Castiel said quickly. “I think, Gabriel, that it might be time to face the facts.” He gave Gabriel’s hand a little squeeze, harder than Gabriel was expecting. “You’re pregnant.”

Gabriel looked at Castiel. He looked at him seriously and saw how much this was hurting him. It wasn’t an intentional hurt and it certainly wasn’t a hurt that Castiel wanted to show, but it was still there in his eyes. Castiel wanted to be in Gabriel’s position. Even an unplanned mistake of a pregnancy would have made him ecstatic. It was cosmically unfair that it had happened to Gabriel and not to him. 

“Yes,” Gabriel agreed slowly. “I am.” 

Castiel smiled weakly at him.

“Do you know what you want to do?” Dr. Shurley interrupted them. “I mean…um…obviously, you’ve got options and I could give you some pamphlets.” 

Gabriel did have options. He didn’t have to keep the baby. He could have an abortion or put it up for adoption. There were things he could do. He just couldn’t think straight about them right now. 

“I don’t have to make up my mind now, do I?” he asked. 

“No, but the sooner the better,” the doctor advised. “I’ll get you some pamphlets about pregnancy too. You should have those.”  
Gabriel nodded dumbly. He was sure there were lots of things he hadn’t considered, lots of things he needed to know. He was focused on the most immediate of his problems – John Winchester and what the man would do when he found out. 

**

Gabriel left the doctor’s office with his hands full of pamphlets. His mind was racing. There was so much information, most of it information he didn’t want to know. The pamphlet on the top of the pile was about complications in later-in-life pregnancies. The sun outside, the busy street filled with people going about their business, it all seemed completely at odds with the ugly feelings Gabriel was experiencing. If he had his way it would be raining. 

“Are you going to tell Sam?” Castiel asked him quietly. He glanced up and down the busy road. “We should get back. We’ve been gone a long time.” 

Gabriel checked his watch, frowning. It was the middle of the week so they weren’t running any afternoon matinées but they’d missed the rehearsals that ran instead. They’d only gone to the town for a half-day. It had turned into something much more. 

“I suppose I’ll have to,” Gabriel said with a sigh. “Sam’s going to notice how long we’ve been gone. Everyone will.”

“Do you want to walk or catch the bus? It’ll take us to the outskirts at least,” Castiel said. 

“We might as well walk,” Gabriel said, shuffling the pamphlets, wishing he had a bag to put them in. 

Castiel reached out, taking them from his hands. He still had the brown paper bag from when he’d bought Gabriel’s pregnancy test and he shoved them in there. 

“I can carry them,” he said. 

Gabriel nodded. He pushed his hands deep into his pockets, stalking off in the direction of the circus tent erected on the edge of the town. He wished the pamphlets were Castiel’s. He wished Castiel was the one who was dealing with all of this. Castiel wouldn’t be so afraid. Castiel would actually welcome this. 

**

They reached the circus an hour later. Gabriel regretted turning down the ride on the bus. Even if they’d been waiting at the bus stop for a while, it wouldn’t have taken them so long. He didn’t like walking and he liked it even less now. He was starving by now. The nausea he’d experienced early was completely gone and Gabriel was fantasizing about eating a big box of cereal all on his own. He didn’t care about milk. In fact, the thought of milk made him feel weird, but he’d really like a handful or two of sugary cereal. 

As soon as they got within sight of tent, someone started shouting Castiel’s name. Gabriel hung back, frowning. He didn’t have anyone worrying about him or where he’d been. It wasn’t Sam making his way towards them now, it was Anna. Her bright red hair caught the rays of the sun, making it look as if she was on fire. 

“Castiel where have you been?” she demanded as she reached them. “Dean’s been going crazy. He was about to take the car about and look for you. This is the sort of thing people expect from Gabriel but not from you.”

“And why do they expect it from Gabriel?” Gabriel interrupted angrily. “Because I’m not one of you so I’ve got to be leading Castiel astray. It’s his fault we were in town all day. He was the one who wouldn’t just leave things alone! Him!” 

He snatched the bag of pamphlets from Castiel’s hands and stalked passed them, heading for his trailer. He knew Anna didn’t mean to insult him but she had and Gabriel wasn’t going to pretend it didn’t sting. It didn’t matter how long he stayed in the show. It didn’t matter that he was with Sam. 

He would never really belong the way that Castiel did. Castiel, who had a sister and a boyfriend who worried about him. What did Gabriel have? His own family had cut all contact with him and Sam was only interested in sneaking around with him. 

All Gabriel really had in the world was the baby he was carrying and he wasn’t even sure if he was going to keep that. 

He unlocked the door to his trailer and climbed in, throwing the bag down on his bed. He didn’t feel like performing tonight. He didn’t feel like staying. He’d joined the circus to get away from the pressures of society that had seemed so insurmountable at the time but he’d just joined a new society, one in which he was the constant outsider. 

He could go away, start again. Gabriel wasn’t afraid of change. He could have an abortion and walk away a free man with no ties to the past or he could keep the baby and they could be a little family on their own. If he stayed, Gabriel was almost certain he would have to have an abortion. He wasn’t about to romanticize getting pregnant by mistake. It wasn’t fate, it was a fluke, but Gabriel didn’t want to get rid of the baby just to stay on in the circus. To him that felt wrong. 

Gabriel pulled his suitcase out from under his bed and opened it. It was empty, had been empty since the day he’d moved in. He’d thought he’d found a home then but he’d been wrong. Gabriel had savings, a bank account he paid into every month and money from before he’d joined the circus tucked away in it. He had more than enough to start a new life for himself and his child. 

He started throwing things into the suitcase. He wasn’t thinking straight, wasn’t really looking at what he packed. He just wanted to get away as fast as he could. He’d go somewhere, clear his head for a few nights and then make a proper plan. There was a motel in the town. He could get a room and think it out there. 

There was a knock on the trailer door.

“Go away!” Gabriel shouted. “I don’t want to talk to anyone.”

“Gabe?” came Sam’s worried voice. “Gabriel, it’s me. Can I come in?” 

Gabriel swallowed. He didn’t really want to see Sam. Sam could make him reconsider his plan. He wanted to just get on the road and go, but even as he was thinking that, he found himself trudging to the door to let Sam in. Gabriel didn’t want to leave without saying something to Sam. Sam deserved that. Gabriel didn’t hold any illusions that Sam would want to leave this life. He wasn’t about to ask Sam to run away with him, but he thought Sam should know why he was going. 

He wished Sam would come with him. 

Sam climbed in, wrapping his arms around Gabriel. He held him tight and Gabriel sighed, leaning against him. Sam felt strong, he felt safe. Gabriel just wanted to stay wrapped up in his arms and forget the outside world, but he knew that wasn’t possible. 

“Where were you?” Sam asked softly. “I’ve been worrying about you all afternoon.” 

“Yeah, I heard,” Gabriel muttered. “There was a manhunt on for Cas apparently.”

Sam pulled back, looking down at Gabriel’s face. “I was coming to look for you.” 

Gabriel tried not to feel mollified. He didn’t want to lose the righteous anger that had been coursing through his veins a moment ago. Just because Sam cared about him, didn’t change the rest of it. Gabriel was still pregnant, he was still unwanted. He still needed to get away. 

He pulled away from Sam, turning back to the suitcase. He knew he could put it away, pretend he’d only had it out to look for something but there was no point in denying what he was doing. He picked up some of his old clothes from the washing pile and shoved them in. Sam watched him in evident confusion. 

“Gabriel, what’s going on? Are you going somewhere?” 

“Yes,” Gabriel said firmly. “I am.” 

He glanced over his shoulder at Sam and wished that he hadn’t. Sam was looking at him like a kicked puppy, hurt and betrayed. 

“Why?” Sam asked quietly. 

Gabriel slammed the lid of his suitcase down and turned to face Sam. 

“Because I’m pregnant, okay?” he said, trembling as he said it. “I’m pregnant and we both know what your dad will say. We both know I’m leaving one way or another, so why not go with my head held high?” 

“You’re pregnant?” Sam repeated. He put his hand out, steadying himself against the wall of the trailer as if the news had knocked the wind out of him. 

“Surprise,” Gabriel said. He was close to finding the whole situation hysterical. “I know, I didn’t think I could do it either, Sam, but here I am. So I’ve got to leave because I’m keeping it.” 

“Gabriel,” Sam murmured. 

Then he surged forward and his arms were around Gabriel. He kissed him and Gabriel felt his knees sag under him. He was so angry before, filled with a desire to run and never look back but now he was in Sam’s arms, he didn’t think he could go, not if it meant never seeing him again. It would be so easy to pretend there were no problems facing them. Easier still to imagine that a baby would solve all their issues but Gabriel knew that wasn’t true. He had to be stronger than that. 

Sam broke the kiss, beaming at him. 

“Don’t pretend you’re happy,” Gabriel said, pressing his face into Sam’s chest.

“I am happy,” Sam insisted. 

Gabriel took a deep breath and forced himself out of Sam’s arms, sitting down on the bed.

“What about when your father finds out?” he asked. “We both know the answer to that, Sam. You’re not going to stand up to him. You’re not going to walk out on him. He makes everyone miserable but you won’t leave.” 

It might be taking things too far, but Gabriel supposed if he had bridges to burn, he might as well burn them now. Gabriel had watched John Winchester grind his sons down, had seen them flinch when he raised his hand and lie when they thought it would make him happy. Gabriel didn’t want that future for his child. 

“I could,” Sam said quietly. “I could do it, Gabriel, for you. For us.” 

Gabriel nodded. 

“Sure,” he said. 

He locked his suitcase and gave Sam a brief, sweet kiss on the lips before pulling away.

“You’re still going?” Sam asked, confused.

“I told you, I made up my mind. If you want to find me, I’m going to be at the motel in town for the next few days. I’ll probably stay until Sunday.”

Gabriel knew he was giving himself too long. He knew he would be waiting for the knock on the door every day until he left town, but he wanted to give Sam time. He still had a glimmer of hope that Sam would be strong enough to walk away. He didn’t like the idea of giving Sam an ultimatum. He wasn’t going to tell Sam it was him or his dad. He was just going to leave now because it made everything easier on both of them. Sam wasn’t forced to choose. Gabriel made that choice for him. 

Carefully, he moved past Sam, holding his suitcase clasped against him. Sam let him go. Gabriel tried not to feel his heartbreak. He knew he was playing to form. He knew that everyone had believed he would one day go, that he wasn’t planning to stay. He was proving them right but Gabriel really didn’t care. He would stay where he wasn’t wanted and he’d never been wanted in the Winchester’s Circus. 

He still wished Sam would call after him or come with him. It wasn’t to be though. Sam stood inside the trailer as Gabriel stepped out, into the late-afternoon sun. He took a deep breath, breathing in a lungful of the scent of sawdust and popcorn. He would miss that scent. He would miss a lot of things. He wouldn’t let that change his mind though. 

He walked with his head held high, well aware that he’d left almost half his sparse life behind him in the trailer. Maybe those things would be sent to him or maybe he’d leave them behind for good. 

All Gabriel knew, was that he needed to focus on the new life he was planning, the one with his baby. Knickknacks and trinkets left behind in a trailer where nowhere near as important as that. 

**

Sam felt as if his world was falling apart. Gabriel had told him he was pregnant, had kissed him and then he’d walked away as if Sam meant nothing. Sam knew that was the whole truth. He knew Gabriel was protecting them. He was choosing to leave to keep the relationship a secret, to hide the fact that Sam had fathered a child. He was giving Sam an out. Sam didn’t ever need to tell his father. Life could go one the way it had always done. John Winchester would never need to know that he had a grandchild out there somewhere in the world. He would never need to know about Sam’s love affair with Gabriel. 

Sam could choose to be that man, to wash his hands of everything and let Gabriel leave but that was not the kind of man Sam was. He loved Gabriel. He didn’t want Gabriel to leave. He didn’t want his baby brought up miles away, never knowing who its father was. 

Sam wasn’t going to just let Gabriel walk away. He wasn’t going to get by on letters and occasional photos sent in the post. He wanted them to be together. He wanted to support Gabriel through this pregnancy. He wanted to be the father his dad had never been able to be. He wanted to be part of a family that he built with Gabriel. 

He couldn’t just let Gabriel walk out of his life. Sam stumbled out of Gabriel’s trailer, on to the ground outside. He didn’t feel as if anything was real. He looked around; searching for Gabriel but it seemed that the man was already long gone. 

“Sam!” 

Sam turned at the sound of his brother’s voice. Dean was walking quickly towards him, Castiel and Anna following in his wake. 

“I don’t have time for this, Dean,” Sam said, rubbing his hand across his face.

“Cas caught me up on what’s going on. I didn’t believe him at first,” Dean glanced back at Castiel who shrugged, then back to Sam. “Gabriel’s pregnant. What are you going to do?” 

“I suppose I’ll have to tell dad,” Sam said. The world felt as if it was spinning. It all felt impossible.

Telling his father the truth was the last thing Sam wanted to do. It wasn’t just that Gabriel was pregnant; it was everything that went along with that. It was telling his father about how he’d lied to him, how he’d kept the secret for months. It was telling him about how he’d fallen in love with a man his father didn’t like. Sam already knew that his dad would see it as a betrayal. 

“Do you want to do that?” Dean asked. He looked nervous. Sam knew why. There wasn’t much chance of their father reacting well to the news.

“I can’t just run off, can I? I can’t just leave and not say a word,” Sam said, clenching his hands. “I have to at least try.”

He couldn’t just let Gabriel leave and he couldn’t just run after him without considering his responsibilities. His dad was still his dad. Sam had to give him this chance. He had to give them all this chance. 

Dean nodded slowly. 

“Right, well, I’m on your side if you need someone there,” he said. 

“What if I leave?” Sam asked quickly. 

Dean closed his eyes, grimacing. “Is that a choice you think you’ll have to make?” 

“Yeah,” Sam said with a sigh. “I really think it is.” 

“I don’t know, Sam,” Dean said, opening his eyes to look desperately at his brother. Sam knew this wasn’t fair on Dean, that it would be tearing him apart to even think about it. “I’ve got…he’s our dad. And Cas is here.”

“I’d go,” Cas said quietly, reaching for Dean’s hand. “I’d go anywhere you’d be.”

Anna sighed. “I guess that means you’ve got me too, I can’t let Castiel run off on his own. Dean’ll only get him into trouble.” 

Dean shook his head. “Cas likes trouble,” he said, squeezing Castiel’s hand tight. 

Sam swallowed. That took a little weight off his shoulders. He had his brother behind him, even if Dean wasn’t completely happy about it, and there was also Cas and Anna. Sam wouldn’t be alone. If things went wrong, if he was told to get out and never come back, he’d have support to fall back on. 

“Right, I guess there’s no time like the present,” he said. 

**

Gabriel lounged on the uncomfortable motel bed. He’d checked his bank account, drawn out a bit of money and booked a room. He’d also bought a bag full of candy and was stuffing his face and enjoying pay-per-view porn. It wasn’t even good stuff. It was pretty tacky and about a decade old but Gabriel figured he should enjoy it while he had a chance to. Soon he was going to have a kid in toe and days like this would have to stop. He’d have to start acting like a grown up. He’d need to buy a house, get a job, settle down.

It was a lot of responsibility and Gabriel wasn’t quite ready for that yet. So he’d decided to dig his heels in and enjoyed his freedom for a little longer. 

There was the roar of a car engine outside. Gabriel sighed and turned the TV up. The slap of skin on skin and the sound of moans managed to cover the noise of the engine. Gabriel tipped his head to the side, looking at the actors on the screen. He was pretty sure the position they were in couldn’t be comfortable. 

There was a knock on the door and Gabriel grumbled. He turned off the TV and got up, grabbing his bag of candy and fishing out a lollipop. He shoved it into his mouth and dropped the candy back on the bed. He was probably about to get yelled out for having porn on so loud, so he wanted something a little sweet to temper all the swearing he was about to do. 

Gabriel opened the door, squaring his shoulders, ready for a fight. 

Nothing could prepare him for who was standing there. 

Sam leaned against the doorframe. He looked exhausted. There was a bright red mark on his cheek. His hair was a mess. 

“Sam,” Gabriel said shakily. He reached up to touch Sam’s cheek. Sam winced but let him brush his fingers across the red mark. “Who hit you?”

“My dad,” Sam said. “I told him about you, about us and about the baby. It didn’t go too well.”

“No, it doesn’t sound like it did,” Gabriel said quietly, feeling anger boiling up inside him. He wanted to go right back to the circus and give John Winchester a taste of his own medicine. 

“I’m not going back,” Sam said quietly. 

“Then what’s going to happen?” Gabriel asked. 

Sam stepped back from the doorway, pointing towards the black muscle car in the parking space behind him. Dean was sitting in the front. He looked like he was in a worse mess than Sam and Gabriel guessed that Dean had stepped in when things had started to go bad. He was sitting there, tapping the wheel, obviously desperate to jump out and get involved. Castiel was beside him, his head turned and Gabriel guessed he was trying to talk Dean down. In the back seat, Gabriel could see Anna and Jo, surrounded by a number of hastily packed bags. 

“I think we’re all going,” Sam said. “Do you mind if we come in?”

“No, that’s cool,” Gabriel said, stepping away from the door. The whole thing was completely surreal to him. “I’ve only got candy to share though.” 

“We can order in pizza,” Sam said, a little half-smile playing on his mouth. He motioned to the group in the car, letting them know it was okay to come in. 

In a few minutes, the motel room was full. There wasn’t enough room on the bed for Gabriel to sit down, not with Anna sat on the edge and Dean and Castiel taking up most of it. There were bags taking up most of the floor. Castiel had Dean’s head in his lap, carefully stroking his fingers through his hair, avoiding the bruises that were coming up on his face. Jo was dialing for pizza. Sam wrapped his arms around Gabriel from behind, his hands coming to press against Gabriel’s slightly pudgy stomach. 

“It’s going to be okay,” he said softly. 

“How will it be okay?” Dean asked, pushing himself up from Castiel’s lap. “What are we going to do? It’s not as if we’ve got a lot of skills between us all. I can throw knives and Cas can climb stuff. Maybe we could become cat burglars?” 

“Dean,” Castiel said softly. 

“He’s right,” Anna said. “We don’t really know how to do anything else. Gabriel is the most experienced out of all of us.”

Gabriel licked his lips. He realized he was the default adult in the room. Everyone else was well into their twenties, Dean was only a few birthdays away from his thirties, but Gabriel was still the oldest. He was the one who’d had a life outside of the circus, a normal job. 

Looking around the room, he wondered how they would manage. Gabriel couldn’t exactly walk back into his old life and the others were looking at low paying, entry-level jobs. It would be completely different from the lives they’d always known. Gabriel wasn’t even sure it was right to ask them to do it. 

“I have a bit of money,” he said quietly. “I think there’s something else we could do, but we’ll probably have to start small.” 

“How much money?” Sam asked nervously. “And just what is this plan?”

“Before I ran away, I worked in my family’s investment company. I have a pretty solid nest egg,” Gabriel said. “And I’ve always had a good eye for projects to invest in. What do you think? A circus co-operative. We all get a share, we all get a say.” 

Sam smiled. “It’s an idea,” he said, nuzzling his nose in Gabriel’s hair. “We might need to plan a bit more.” 

***  
 **Twelve Months Later:**

Gabriel bounced the pudgy little baby on his knee. His son was five months old. It had been a hard time, starting up the new circus and being pregnant, but there’d been a lot of drive and determination to get it done before the baby arrived. They’d got the first show up and going by the time Gabriel was six months along. Their circus had grown – Ellen and Bobby had joined them, and they’d picked up other waifs and strays along the way. 

Gabriel was working as the moneyman, running everything behind the scenes. He missed the limelight and he missed being a clown, but it was better for him to be off-stage for now. Gabriel had been chomping at the bit to get back into the ring, but once the baby was born, he was grateful that he wasn’t on stage doing pratfalls every night. It was exhausting being a father. 

Still, he made it a point to come and watch rehearsals whenever he could. Dean made a fine ringmaster, and he still kept up his routine with Jo. Anna was the most graceful woman on the flying trapeze, doing death defying stunts but always landing on her feet. 

Castiel had bowed out of the trapeze business for a bit. He’d put on weight, rather a lot of it in fact, especially around his middle and Gabriel hadn’t been at all surprised when that little bundle of joy had been announced as being on its way.

Sam was still their strong man. He still wore his ridiculous loincloth. He was still coated in oil until he glistened but now it when he came off stage; it was into the waiting arms of his family. There was no sneaking around. No stolen kisses or glances. They were a family now and everyone knew it. It had meant a lot of change, but Gabriel felt that it had been worth it. 

Gabriel liked watching Sam and he knew their son liked to see his father too. The little boy cooed loudly, smiling in delight as he watched his father moving around the ring, running through his routine. Sam smiled back at them and waved, breaking his concentration for a moment to jog up to them and pick up his son. 

“You two enjoying yourself?” he asked, swinging the little boy up and tucking him in tight against his chest. Almost immediately, their son grabbed a handful of Sam’s hair and pulled. 

“We’re having a great time,” Gabriel agreed, smiling up at Sam.

He would never have thought that this would be where their road would lead them. He had never imagined that one day, it would be him and Sam with a son of their own but that just showed him how much he didn’t know. 

When he’d walked away from the circus, he hadn’t expected this and it was all the sweeter for it.


End file.
